This is standard corporate strategy nowadays. Instead of staffing up expensive customer service departments they wait for posts to go viral on Twitter, Reddit, HN etc. and only handle those.
Externalize triage costs to public forums. Prioritize human support for high profile social media users and viral posts. Reap good PR of solving the problem publicly. Forum owners like this too because it underlines their community value. Win win win (unless you don’t have social media clout).